text: Western Asia has very little tin ore; the few sources that have recently been found are too insignificant to have played a major role during most of ancient history.  However, it is possible that they were exploited at the start of the Bronze Age and are responsible for the development of early bronze manufacturing technology. Kestel, in Southern Turkey, is the site of an ancient cassiterite mine that was used from 3250 to 1800 BC. It contains miles of tunnels, some only large enough for a child. A grave with children who were probably workers has been found. It was abandoned, with crucibles and other tools left at the site.
  While there are a few sources of cassiterite in Central Asia, namely in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Afghanistan, that show signs of having been exploited starting around 2000 BC, archaeologists disagree about whether they were significant sources of tin for the earliest Bronze Age cultures of the Middle East.
  In Northern Asia the only tin deposits considered exploitable by ancient peoples occur in the far eastern region of Siberia. This source of tin appears to have been exploited by the Eurasian Steppe people known as the Seima-Turbino culture around 2000 BC as well as by northern Chinese cultures around the same time.
  Eastern Asia has a number of small cassiterite deposits along the Yellow River which were exploited by the earliest Chinese Bronze Age culture of Erlitou and the Shang dynasty (2500 to 1800 BC). However, the richest deposits for the region, and indeed the world, lie in Southeastern Asia, stretching from Yunnan in China to the Malay Peninsula. The deposits in Yunnan were not mined until around 700 BC, but by the Han dynasty had become the main source of tin in China according to historical texts of the Han, Jin, Tang, and Song dynasties. Other cultures of Southeast Asia exploited the abundant cassiterite resources sometime between the third and second millennia BC, but due to the lack of archaeological work in the region little else is known about tin exploitation during ancient times in that part of the world.
  Tin was used in the Indian subcontinent starting between 1500 and 1000 BC. While India does have some small scattered deposits of tin, they were not a major source of tin for Indian Bronze Age cultures as shown by their dependence on imported tin.